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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26510521">Spider Lilies</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/surprisepink/pseuds/surprisepink'>surprisepink</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Extra Treat, Gen, Hanahaki Disease, Hanahaki-Typical Body Horror, Non-Graphic Violence, canon-typical Jeritza</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-10-08</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-10-08</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 03:00:44</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,554</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26510521</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/surprisepink/pseuds/surprisepink</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Thin red petals fell, and Jeritza knew he was one battle closer to his last breath.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Darkest Night 2020</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Spider Lilies</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/KelpieChaos/gifts">KelpieChaos</a>.</li>



    </ul></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Emile watched his father fall, bloody and broken just as the man deserved. His whole body shook, and he was forced to take several long, slow breaths before he was able to begin to still himself.  This had been nothing like the other times he’d killed, the mundane deaths that one saw during boyhood. Those childish acts, plunging kittens into the river after Mother said they were too sickly to thrive or helping to finish off hunted deer that were already bleeding out from arrow wounds were nothing compared to this. In those times he had felt a sense of satisfaction, like a reaper helping the inevitable along. Never pleased with himself, never <i>thrilled</i>.</p><p>It was amazing how much blood was contained in the human body, and how much of it could be spilled by just a few carefully placed cuts. The neck, Emile knew, was a point of vulnerability in all creatures great and small. Once he'd put his knife to it it was easy, so easy, to slice through the flesh, to let crimson flow down his father's body. To watch as he crumpled into the ground.</p><p>Emile's father trusted him in the way that all fathers trusted their sons, with a confidence that a boy raised right would never rebel. A foolish assumption: there were tales aplenty of boys taking their father's lives. Mercedes herself had once whispered to him a fascinating story she'd read, where a boy had killed his father in accordance with a prophecy.</p><p>(“Isn’t it interesting?” she said with a giggle. </p><p>He had to agree.</p><p>Something about marriage to the man's own mother followed, and when he reflected on his own situation, Jeritza had to laugh at the irony.)</p><p>He closed his father's eyes because it seemed like that was what you were supposed to do when someone died, though Emile didn't particularly dislike the empty gaze that now lay within them. It provided a sense of finality.</p><p>Something overtook him then, beyond just the rush of victory. It was an indescribable happiness, as if every moment in his life had led up to this one. And at the same time, it felt like his life was about to end: his chest tightened, like his lungs were full of phlegm. A coughing fit overtook him, and the coughing, too, was something new. It felt like something was being expelled from his body, something painful and bitter and—</p><p>He pulled his hand away when the coughing had ceased, and in it was a few petals, long and thin and not quite blood red. Petals he couldn't recognize. Odd, but it didn't matter where they had come from. Shrugging, he tossed them onto the corpse.</p><p>His father didn't deserve a funeral, but Emile supposed that he got one anyway.</p><p> </p><p>There was a legend in Fódlan—or rather, there have been many, and this was but one legend among hundreds. It went like this: a strong enough love will manifest in one's body in the form of flowers that will take root and grow in the heart. They will spread from there, to lungs, kidneys, liver, slowly claiming each organ for their own until the whole body ceases to function. The victim—the lover—dies in agony, and what is more romantic than this?</p><p>Jeritza didn’t care much for stories anymore, but this one was too fascinating to ignore.</p><p>“It is the end for me,” croaked one man that he met on his travels, “but ah, my corpse will be beautiful.” The man had made a happy life for himself: a small cottage, a steady job, a dog. But with each unsteady breath it was clear that he spoke the truth, and the sorrow of lost love had overtaken him.</p><p>The man coughed and pure white gardenias scattered. Jeritza nodded, understanding the man more than he would ever realize. The Death Knight was quiet for the moment, and so Jeritza was enough himself to not offer to help that man speed his funeral along. "All deaths are beautiful in their own ways," he said. The man laughed, thinking him poetic. Perhaps he was, but only because life itself was a poem—and thus so was death.</p><p>Jeritza had realized long ago that this legend of lost-love-flowers was true, and so it was not a surprise to meet someone else who suffered from it. The legend went on to say that breaking the curse was possible: merely have one's love returned, or else allow it to be forgotten. Easier said than done, perhaps, but still something that <i>could</i> be done.</p><p>The man had elected to instead live out the rest of his short life slowly suffocating until the blossoms claimed him entirely, and in that way Jeritza felt a sense of kinship with him. Only the man's love was for an old friend, a woman who was married to someone else. It was a love that could be reciprocated and simply, unfortunately, was not.</p><p>Jeritza was different: his love was not for a person. He had wondered at first if it had to do with Mercedes, but though he cared for her as deeply as he was capable of as the monster inside of him ached for her blood, looking at her never made him feel the now familiar tightness in his chest. No, it was the thrill of battle, the passion of ending a life that he loved more dearly than anything else, and that was something that could never love him in return.</p><p>He, too, would die writhing in the agony of this unrequited feeling—if nothing else killed him first. Fitting, really, that death would beget death in this way.</p><p> </p><p>Forgetting this love was no more an option than having it returned. The battlefield was his ballroom, enemy soldiers the ones Jeritza courted. To be at war was a dance of the highest caliber, and to kill?</p><p>To kill was lovemaking.</p><p>There was a flutter in his chest with each swing of his blade, a tightness in his lungs every time he watched a man breath his last. He hid it well, to even his own surprise. The Death Knight was not exactly subtle in his intentions, nor in his feelings. But Jeritiza had always been good at disguising illness, aches, pains. Mercedes always chided him for that, told him to take better care of himself, but it was better not to appear weak.</p><p>One day the Flame Emperor noticed the thin red petals that scattered as he removed his helmet. (Edelgard, he supposed he ought to call her. She didn’t hold the Emperor in her heart the same way that Jeritza held the Knight.)</p><p><i>Edelgard</i> looked at the petals, then at him. She'd never put much stock in legends, and had likely not believed in this one until this very moment, but she wasn't such a fool that she would ignore something like this.</p><p>"Tell me if you reach a point that you're no longer suited for combat," she said.</p><p>"I will allow the flowers to take me before I stop fighting," he replied, and Edelgard nodded. Behind her, the man that was her shadow did the same.</p><p> </p><p>"Emile," said Mercedes, setting aside the teapot. Her voice was laced with subtle concern the way that drove Jeritza half mad. She was irritatingly kind, and yet he couldn’t reject her kindness. "Are you all right? You've been prone to coughing for a while, but... it's been getting worse since the war began."</p><p>By that point, Jeritiza had begun to cough even in the absence of death. Sometimes it was the simple memory of a previous kill that triggered it, and other times it was the anticipation of combat. Even seeing Mercedes—his elder sister, yes, but just as much a vulnerable young woman whose life he could so easily end—had begun to the occasional reaction. It was fortunate for her that she was willing to be killed by him. Even more fortunate that he can’t, for Edelgard would not approve.</p><p>"I'm fine," he replies between fits, compacting the petals in his hand so that she can't see them. She'll know the legend, and he prefers she not worry about it. Mercedes is... inquisitive. She will want to <i>help</i>, even though Jeritza is beyond helping.</p><p>"You know you can tell me anything."</p><p>"As I said, I'm fine."</p><p>"Hm," Mercedes said. "I'll prepare you a tincture of ginger and marshmallow root. You'll take it for me, won't you?"</p><p>"I'll consider it," he replied. It made no difference. Such simple remedies can do nothing for him. He stopped thinking of this condition as a curse and started thinking of it as a gift: a sign that he's alive, and a sign that one day he will die.</p><p> </p><p>The Emperor saw victory, and Jeritza was there to watch it happen. He had little to do with the victory itself, but she thanked him for his service nonetheless. Afterward, Mercedes stood beside him, eyes moist. She reached for his hand, squeezed it, murmured <i>we’ve won</i>. </p><p>Even with both of their words, he felt empty. Hollow. For the Death Knight, there would be no end to the war, only changes. Each and every breath had begun to take more effort than before, yet the life ahead of him still felt so very long.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I have a <a href="https://twitter.com/surprisepink_">fanfic twitter</a> now if you're into that!</p></blockquote></div></div>
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